


Stargazing & Other Means of Courtship

by EmHunter



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: 18OI AU Week (Yuri!!! on Ice), 18OI AU Week 2020: Day 1, Alternate Universe - Farm/Ranch, Alternate Universe - Harvest Moon, Alternate Universe - Magic, Falling In Love, Harvest Moon - Freeform, How To Court A Harvest God, Idiots in Love, M/M, Magic, Romance, Starry Night Festival (Harvest Moon), Victor Nikiforov is Extra, do not copy to another site, in any setting and any universe, they give gifts, they hold hands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:55:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24479821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmHunter/pseuds/EmHunter
Summary: Yuuri has always wanted to be a farmer. He starts the life of his dreams in the deserted valley of Echo Village.One day, he accidentally summons the Harvest God of these lands - a beautiful and somewhat eccentric man named Victor.Or: Victuuri goes Harvest Moon. Because they will fall in love in any setting and any universe.Written for 18OI AU Week 2020 Day 1 and the prompt Fantasy/Fairytale/Mythology.
Relationships: Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov
Comments: 35
Kudos: 150
Collections: 18OI AU Week 2020





	Stargazing & Other Means of Courtship

**Author's Note:**

> This is for all the Harvest Moon lovers in the server who shamelessly enabled this fic when it was just a baby idea about gifts thrown into a pond and summoning Victor. 
> 
> Special thanks to **Tundra_Kitsune** for the epic "I see you cut your hair. _Again._ " She has created some amazing artwork of Farmer Yuuri and Harvest God Victor for this, which I am going to show off as soon as I can figure out how to embed it here. :D
> 
> Thanks also to **KamRaeTay** for the in-between and all-time feedback. I included your prettiest omelettes! 💖

Yuuri always wanted to be a farmer.

There was not much farm work going round his parents’ hot springs resort though, and bamboo and wasabi was not what he wanted to grow. Instead, he grew daikon in his own small patch of the back yard every winter and strawberries in summer. But it was not enough. Yuuri longed for changing seasons, for a whole variety of crops. He preferred the company of animals to that of people. He liked to take care of them, and they calmed in his presence. They suited his quiet personality.

Once every year for as long as Yuuri could remember, his parents had a visitor.

The first time Yuuri met Dunhill, he was very afraid of him. He dressed like nobody Yuuri had ever seen before, in rough leather and cotton and with a tall hat. He had wild hair and an even wilder moustache and a pointy chin-beard, jet black when Yuuri first met him but more and more peppered with grey over the years until he turned completely white. He didn’t speak much, and when he did it was more of a grumpy rumble that had Yuuri hiding behind his mother’s kimono when he heard it for the first time, peeking cautiously out from behind her legs.

But soon Yuuri sought the company of the visitor for all the days he stayed. He was a quiet one, like Yuuri, except for when he talked about crops, or hit the sake with Yuuri’s father in the evenings.

Yuuri would accompany him to their local market where Dunhill bought and sold his vegetable seeds. Dunhill took great interest in Yuuri’s little garden and would always take the time to patiently answer all his questions about the crops in his hometown and how Yuuri could improve his own farming. He crouched down with Yuuri to dig in the earth and tell him about the importance of the quality of soil.

Before Yuuri was able to read, he received his most treasured possession from Dunhill – a big, heavy book on farm life. He would spend hours looking at the pictures. Once he learned to read, he read nothing else. He marvelled at the pictures Dunhill took of his home with the camera he always carried with him. Yuuri wanted to roam around those forests and grow not two but twenty kinds of crops. He wanted to sleep under the stars on hot summer nights while the fireflies danced around him. He wanted to stomp around snow-covered hills and read by the fireplace on cold winter nights.

~~~~~~~

When Yuuri first came to Echo Village, it was nearly deserted.

He had 500 golden coins and a bag of strawberry seeds to his name and was driven by nothing but his own determination and the yearning for a quiet, hardworking life.

The journey had taken him almost two days, and he was so tired he nearly fell off the back of the wagon he had been allowed to ride in the back of for the last bit of the journey, to the small village that would become his new home. Dunhill was waiting for him by what he learned was the General Store, one of the few buildings in the village still occupied. A letter from Yuuri’s parents had announced his arrival, and Yuuri found himself engulfed in a bear hug and introduced to the few people who had not abandoned the village yet.

That first night, Yuuri didn’t see much of his farm. He fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow.

His house was a simple wooden construction but it was everything Yuuri could have asked for. He would have been happy with just a bed and a bookshelf and a closet, perhaps a kitchen. Everything else, his fridge and nightstand and different storage boxes, were a welcome bonus. There were three gravel fields on his farm and lots of room to plough more, including a small terraced section. There was already a barn and a fishing dock. To the east and west of his farm, additional land was closed off by huge boulders that Dunhill told him would be removed in time as town restoration progressed.

Yuuri received a hoe, a watering pot and a sickle from Dunhill when he started out, as well as some turnip seeds. He spent his funds on potato seeds and set to work with grim determination.

He was the happiest he had ever been in his life.

His days consisted of the same routine. Getting up, eating breakfast, watering crops, foraging and selling everything he found, eating dinner, going to sleep. When crops were ripe he would harvest and put them in the shipping box. The next day, when the money for his shipments came, he would buy new seeds. Within his first two weeks Dunhill gifted him with a cow, and he started selling the milk along with vegetables.

Halfway through his first spring three harvest sprites showed up unannounced in his house one morning. Yuuri was a little scared of having to make conversation and a lot relieved when they said they just wanted to say Hello. He could do Hello. One of them was dressed in green and did most of the talking. His name was Phichit. The one in blue, Chris, spoke very little and looked very smug. The third one, Yurio, was clad in red and very rude. Phichit told him that he could always find them in the forest near the river on sunny days should he wish to talk to them. Chris nodded and smiled. Yurio told him not to bother. Yuuri nodded. He was sure he wouldn’t have time for that anyway, especially when they told him that they couldn’t actually help him with his crops.

That morning after watering his crops, Yuuri stood with his hands in his hips over his fields and sighed.

The strawberry seeds his family had given him as a gift and a token of home were causing him trouble. He had conferred with Dunhill, given them the sunniest spot, given them more water, then less, then changed the soil he grew them in to a higher quality one. The strawberries remained puny, the blossoms were few and refused to turn into fruit even as spring drew to an end.

~~~~~~~

It was a sunny day at the end of spring in his first year that Yuuri accidentally summoned the Harvest God. 

He was grumpy that day. Nothing seemed to really work out. He had spent all his earned money on new seeds right away and now there was nothing to do but to water and wait. His daily work was done in the morning when he finished watering the crops and had milked the cow. Once again the strawberries failed to grow, leaving him feeling like a failure. Foraging hadn’t brought about much today either. Yuuri was pausing under a tree by the pond in the forest with his meagre collection of a handful of flowers and three small branches in his arms when he decided not to bother taking it to the shipping box. Now that Rebecca had moved to town and started selling construction blueprints, he feared he should better hold on to the materials he gathered anyway. Not that mint chose to grow in the forest when _he_ needed it!

Frustrated, Yuuri picked up one of the branches and hurled it into the pond.

A flash of white erupted from the pond all of a sudden, hurling Yuuri backwards until he sat on his butt in the grass, supporting his weight with his arms, his glasses crooked on his nose as he stared wide-eyed and slack-jawed at the pond over which something like sparkling fog slowly began to dissolve revealing the form of a… Yuuri pushed his glasses straight up his nose and stared.

There was a man. Hovering. Right over the middle of the pond.

Yuuri blinked. He pinched his arm, but the man was still there.

A very beautiful, ethereal man was definitely hovering over the middle of the pond.

He was dressed in shades of purple – pale lilac trousers with a tunic the colour of berries blending into cheerful orange over it, long sleeves of sheer pale lilac hinting at pale arms underneath. Deep purple gauntlets covered his wrists and shins. He had piercing blue eyes and long silver hair, falling loosely onto his shoulders until it was braided into a thick plait that came all the way down to his ankles. Flowers adorned his hair and the neckline of his tunic, more leaves and flower petals peeking out at his waist below the tunic where it was laced with golden thread. His feet were bare, the left big toe dipping just lightly into the pond water.

Yuuri was still staring when the fog had lifted completely and a pale hand came up in one elegant movement to start rubbing a forehead that would have been pale like the rest of him had it not been for what Yuuri, much to his dismay, realised was most probably the very red imprint left there by a chunk of wood thrown carelessly into the pond.

The man looked around and blinked a couple of times, until his eyes came to rest on Yuuri and a wide heart-shaped smile took over his face.

“Yuuuuuuri!!!” His voice was melodious and gentle. It matched his hovering, somehow.

Yuuri’s eyes widened even more if that was even possible.

“You know my name?” he asked, rather stupidly, but then one didn’t exactly conjure up a fantasy person that knew one’s name by throwing wood into a pond every day.

“Of course I do. I know everything about this village, and many other things too, if you must know.”

He laughed. It sounded warm and cheerful and touched on strings Yuuri didn’t even know he had inside him.

“Who are you?” Yuuri’s eyebrows almost met in the middle, he was scrunching his forehead so much.

The man took a bow that bordered just slightly on the dramatic.

“I am the Harvest God of these lands!”

Yuuri gaped. Blinked once behind his glasses. Then a second time.

“You actually _exist_??” Was what he finally managed to say. “I thought you were simply a legend in one of Dunhill’s books.”

“Ouch! That hurt.” There was a huge dramatic gasp, and a pale hand came down on his chest as if he was gravely wounded. But his blue eyes sparkled so lively, Yuuri could see it from where he still leaned back on his hands in the grass. He sat up and took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes and put them back on. 

For a while he just looked on at how the Harvest God moved his arms and legs around cautiously yet gracefully at the same time, almost like he had not moved them for ages. He looked at them like he noticed them for the first time, almost astonished to see them. Yuuri wondered if he hadn’t had materialised for many years. After all, the village was deserted. Perhaps nobody had summoned the Harvest God for so long that he had to reacquaint himself with his own appearance.

“So what exactly does a Harvest God do?” Yuuri asked, sitting cross-legged now with his elbows resting on his knees.

The long silver braid swung gently as the Harvest God moved his head and cocked it in thinking. One of his fingers came to rest against his lips. He looked cute, Yuuri thought, and made himself blush with it.

“I accept gifts.”

One of Yuuri’s eyebrows climbed high on his forehead.

“That’s something you _do_?” he asked, not exactly impressed.

The Harvest God gave a gracious nod. “As thanks, I work magic and make crops grow better.”

Yuuri hummed, face contorted in thought. Eventually he scrambled to his feet.

“I have to get back to work.” He smiled, a little crookedly. “Unfortunately some of us have to do some real work.” He winked. It felt silly, but the Harvest God smiled, so that was something.

“Will you come see me again, Yuuri?” he asked, his voice like a song.

Yuuri was looking at his meagre foraging pickings that were scattered in the grass where he’d dropped them, contemplating whether he should take them home or not. He looked up at the question. When their eyes met, Yuuri felt as if time stood still for a moment until heat crept up his neck and face.

“I might,” he finally answered. “I’m very busy, you know.”

And he smiled.

He was already halfway down the path when he remembered something and swung around.

“Hey,” Yuuri called out.

The Harvest God had almost vanished into thin air already but seemed to pause now.

“Do you have a name? “ Yuuri asked. “Or do I have to call you Harvest God?”

He seemed to shimmer for a moment, flickering back and forth between mystery and existence in the sunshine reflected by the waterfall. His laughter rang out, refreshing like the pearls of water in the spray. His voice, when it came, sounded already like from another world.

“You can call me Victor.”

~~~~~~~

“I brought you a gift,” Yuuri said the next day when he stood in front of the pond. Needless to say he felt a little silly, talking to the water without knowing for sure whether the Harvest God could even hear him. Yuuri looked around, somewhat worried all of a sudden, but the forest around him was deserted.

He had kept one of the potatoes he had harvested that morning. Instead of selling it, he threw it in the pond.

There was the flash of white light again, the impact so strong that it had Yuuri staggering backwards, though at least he didn’t fall flat on his arse again this time.

“Do you have to do that every time?” he asked, and rolled his eyes.

The fog lifted, and his features softened when he saw Victor smile.

“Yuuuuuuri! You came back.”

“I had some time to spare once my work was done,” Yuuri grinned nonchalantly and sat down in the grass beside the pond. “Did you get your gift?”

“It’s a potato.” Victor pouted.

“It’s a gift.” Yuuri frowned.

“I know, and I appreciate the thought…”

“But?” Yuuri interrupted, one eyebrow raised.

“I like strawberries.” Victor sighed. “They’re my favourite gift. In case you were wondering.”

“Ah.” A treacherous blush ran up Yuuri’s face as he made the brief sound he felt capable of at the mention of strawberries. His voice was low, more of a mutter to himself. “That could be a problem then.”

“Why?” Victor cocked his head in question. He dipped one toe into the pond and flinched, finding the water too cold. It looked almost comical, and still way too graceful, the way he shook out his leg.

“I was given a bag of strawberry seeds by my parents as a farewell gift when I came here,” Yuuri said. “I’d heard they are hard to come by here and I won’t be able to travel home for a long time yet. But for some reason I cannot get them to grow properly. I never had any trouble growing strawberries at home, and I’ve tried what I could, but here I just have no luck with them. And now spring is almost over and there are only a few seeds left, and I want to save those for next year, when I’ll hopefully have more luck and more experience. I don’t know when I’ll be able to build a seed maker, but what would I put in it without being able to harvest something first? And I don’t want to have to write to my parents asking for more seeds, not after all the grand speeches I made about wanting to set out into the world and become a farmer and make it on my own.”

He ended slightly on edge, grim determination showing in his voice and on his face.

Victor had listened to him attentively, head still cocked to the side.

“Do you come from far away then, Yuuri?” he asked when Yuuri fell silent.

A wistful smile played around Yuuri’s lips. “You could say that.”

“I haven’t had company for long… tell me more?” Victor asked.

And Yuuri found it had certainly more appeal to roaming around the woods on his own.

~~~~~~~

The next morning Yuuri stepped out of his house with an almighty yawn. He tied his bandana around his neck and headed to the barn. He liked to think that Hanako was happy to see him, but then he could never tell for sure. Once he had milked and brushed her, he led her outside.

“It’s a nice day today, we need some fresh air and sunshine,” he told her as they emerged through the barn door into the light. He had fenced in a large area around the barn for her to graze in during the daytime, making sure there was a tree in one corner just in case she wanted for some shade. He laughed when she mooed.

Yuuri picked up his watering can and refilled it at the watering spot, then he lugged it over to the first field. The last turnips of the season were coming along nicely, the leaves a fresh and juicy green. He worked quietly, falling into his rhythmic pattern of watering and refilling and watering more crops. By the time he reached the strawberry field he nearly dropped the full watering can on his foot. Cold water sloshed over his feet and the hem of his sturdy overalls when he set down the watering can much more firmly than was necessary. 

“What the…” Yuuri muttered as he crouched down. He blinked several times as he ran his hands carefully through the strawberry plants. But his eyes did not deceive him. The normally smallish, almost withering leaves that gave him so many headaches were flush and bright green, the fine stalks rising proudly towards the sun. Yuuri looked along all two rows of strawberries he had planted, gaping.

Every single one of his strawberry plants was in bloom.

Yuuri rose to his feet and went back to where he was growing turnips and potatoes. It might have been just his imagination. Either than, or they did indeed look stronger and healthier today.

~~~~~~~

“Did you do this?” Yuuri asked after he had summoned Victor by throwing a moondrop flower into the pond.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Victor replied, but he smiled enigmatically.

“Sure you don’t,” Yuuri muttered, and hid a happy smirk by pulling up his bandana over his mouth.

~~~~~~~

The next day Yuuri found so many useful items when foraging in the forest that he had to take a detour home and get his backpack from his house to carry it all home. He sat down in the grass by the pond where he had deposited everything for the time being and picked up a shiitake mushroom. His stomach already rumbled faintly when he thought about cooking it for dinner with rice and the condiments he had brought when he moved here. He was hoping he would be able to make it taste like his mother’s home-cooking, which he missed dreadfully.

One of the mushrooms, however, he threw into the pond.

“Yuuuuuuri!” Victor exclaimed when he emerged. “I like this.”

“As much as strawberries?” Yuuri asked hopefully.

“No,” Victor said, a little sadly. “I like _nothing_ as much as strawberries.”

“Mhmmmm.” Yuuri leaned back on his hands and pursed his lips in slight frustration. But soon enough his eyes began to sparkle behind his glasses again as he looked through his treasures.

“I found enough stones and lumber and mint to build a chicken coop,” he said and looked up.

“You look excited.” Victor smiled.

“I am. I miss eating egg rice bowls.” Yuuri sighed.

From where he was hovering over the middle of the pond, Victor was watching him, one finger poised at his lips, brows crinkled in thought. “That sounds delicious. Will you make it for me one day?”

Yuuri looked over to him, a smile stretching his mouth wide. “If you can catch it.”

~~~~~~~

The same evening, Yuuri started building his chicken coop. A couple of days later he bought his first chicken and named it after his dearest childhood friend. Another day later, he placed the first egg in the nesting box.

~~~~~~~

He stopped by the pond whenever he could, throwing gifts and talking to Victor. He would never have admitted it, but if he fell into bed in the evening and realised he had not seen Victor that day, he actually felt like he had missed out on something important.

~~~~~~~

At the beginning of summer in his first year, Dunhill gifted Yuuri with a fishing rod. Excited about the new source of income and culinary possibilities this provided him with, Yuuri set out into the forest right away to try it out in the streams. His first stop, as usual, was Victor’s pond. He threw in a freshly picked marguerite and watched Victor appear.

“That’s a very fine rod you have there, Yuuri.”

Yuuri blushed but laughter wanted to bubble up at the same time. “Are you saying these things on purpose?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Victor replied, but there was a wicked gleam in his eyes.

“I should be fishing instead of lingering here talking to you.” Yuuri sighed. “I need higher quality soil to raise the quality of my produce, and it’s expensive. Besides, I really cannot wait to cook some dishes from my home, it’s been so long since I’ve been able to eat sushi or sashimi.”

He seemed torn between wanting to stay and having to go. Eyeing the pond in contemplation for a while, he finally asked, “Are there fish in your pond?”

“I can _make_ fish be in my pond.” Victor shrugged. “But I don’t know if I’d want to share. They’re so… fishy.”

“It would mean I could stay here and talk to you while I’m actually getting some work done.”

“Yuuri! Are you tempting me?” Victor placed one hand on his heart and winked at him.

Yuuri’s face crinkled with a frown, while he swallowed down the counter question.

_And what if I was?_

~~~~~~~

A few days later, Yuuri proudly threw his first strawberry into the pond.

It could have been his imagination but he thought the fog flickered a little more colourful that day before it settled. Victor’s smile when he emerged from it was definitely the biggest and brightest yet.

“Yuuuuuuri!” Yuuri ignored the flatter of his heart at the happy exclamation of his name. “Amazing!”

Victor ate the strawberry there and then. He closed his eyes for a moment of sheer bliss.

“Oh, this tastes like it got a lot of sunshine. You made it!” Victor beamed from one ear to the other.

“I think you might have had something to do with that,” Yuuri said timidly but he couldn’t quite hold back the pink tinge of pride from colouring his cheeks.

Victor winked and laughed that tingling laugh of his. “I have no idea what you mean.”

Yuuri laughed as he let himself fall back into the grass.

~~~~~~~

“Yuuri! Who’s this?” Victor asked with a delighted laugh instead of his usual greeting.

Yuuri’s new puppy was rushing back and forth across the grass by the pond, chasing butterflies with so much enthusiasm that he kept toppling over from time to time. Once he came too close to the waterfall he paused and shook himself under the spray before bolting off towards Yuuri, his barks high-pitched and eager.

“Oh.” Sitting in the grass, Yuuri laughed as the excited puppy hopped into his lap and started licking his face with vigour. “A pet shop opened in the village and I’ve always wanted a dog.”

The both of them watched the puppy run after a stick Yuuri had picked up from the grass and thrown further down the path.

“He’s wonderful.” Victor laughed again.

“Vicchan!” Yuuri called out when he saw his puppy chasing one of the wild rabbits that would come out to play because they knew by now that Yuuri never bothered them but left food out for them instead. “Leave that rabbit alone!”

The puppy froze on hearing his name, looked back and forth between Yuuri and the spot where a moment ago he was sure he had seen a rabbit. Finding nothing but grass there now, he hurried back to the pond, looked right at its centre and started barking at Victor.

“Can he _see_ you??” Yuuri asked, mouth wide open in astonishment.

Victor stopped cooing at the puppy and looked at Yuuri. “I’m not sure if they can see me but animals are definitely aware of my presence.”

By the side of the pond, the puppy happily wagged his tail.

“Vicchan.” Victor tilted his head. “That’s an interesting name. What does it mean?”

“Oh…” Yuuri seemed flustered all of a sudden. “It’s… a name from my homeland. A cute endearment of another name.” He checked his fingernails for remnants of earth with great interest.

“What other name?” Victor asked curiously.

Yuuri barely dared to look up. The gush of the waterfall nearly drowned out his answer.

“Victor,” he finally said.

For centuries to come, the harvest sprites and the creatures of the forest would remember this as the day that the Harvest God blushed.

~~~~~~~

“There will be fireworks tomorrow night,” Yuuri said one day in late summer of the first year. “You can probably see them from here, too.”

“Really?” Victor’s smile became wide and heart-shaped. “This means enough people have come back to live in the village. It’s been so long since I’ve seen fireworks.” He sighed.

“I was thinking…” Yuuri attentively watched a grasshopper jump back and forth a little way beside his right knee. Finally he looked back up at Victor, and found him looking straight at him, expectantly.

“I was thinking I could bring a picnic and watch the fireworks from here.” Yuuri’s face felt red. The summer heat, Yuuri told himself.

“I would like that very much.” Victor’s voice sounded faint. The roaring of the waterfall, Yuuri told himself.

~~~~~~~

Yuuri arrived with his picnic in the hottest hour of the day. He spread the blanket under the giant tree close to the pond, in the shade, his face scrunched in concentration. Victor was hovering in his usual place over the middle of the pond, smiling his happy, heart-shaped smile as Yuuri stepped close to the water’s edge. He was just about to list all the food he had brought when Victor said something quite unexpected.

“Close your eyes.”

“What? Victor, this is not funny!”

“Yuuuuuri! Close your eyes!”

Yuuri huffed, resigned, but he closed his eyes for he knew he would never hear the end of it.

He heard the birds chirping extra loud in the trees, the splashing of the waterfall. Smallest drops of spray hit his face and dried immediately in the summer heat. Suddenly the small hair at the back of his neck stood up as he felt something like a presence right in front of him where he was standing close to the pond. Yuuri scrunched up his face but kept his eyes dutifully closed, even when the fresh scent of flowers and forest suddenly met his nostrils. The flaming heat of a blush rushed into his cheeks when he felt the brush of tender lips over his mouth.

“Yuuri.” Yuuri’s heart sped up in his chest. Victor sounded so… close. So real.

“Open your eyes.”

For the second time since he had met him, Yuuri fell backwards onto his butt.

“Wha—what is this??” he stammered. “You’re real??!!”

Victor smiled and nodded. His heart-shaped smiled looked even lovelier from up close.

“For one day each year I’m allowed to turn human. I never did before, because there was never anything or anyone that made me want to try. But I wanted to spend today with _you_.”

“Oh.”

For a moment Yuuri stared up at Victor from where he was sitting in the grass, then he accepted the hand Victor was reaching out to him to help him up.

“Are you happy, Yuuri?” Victor asked when they stood facing each other and Yuuri tried to pat the grass off his clothes. “You look happy.”

Yuuri knew what he looked like. His nose was sunburnt and his hair too long, his forehead glistening with sweat because it was much too hot for his liking, and his rough farmer’s overalls were everything but elegant. But he knew that arguing with Victor would most probably be pointless, so he accepted the compliment with a smile and a little huff, and pointed at the picnic blanket motioning for Victor to sit down.

They spent the day in the shade of the giant beach tree, talking as they ate their way through the picnic Yuuri had prepared. There were sandwiches and onigiri, boiled eggs and tomato salad, sliced melon and lots and lots of strawberries, milk pudding and shortcakes for dessert.

The darkness brought the fireworks and they watched, excited like children, as the cloudless sky, so close here at the top of the mountain, lit up in red and gold and green and blue, magical flowers bursting into bloom in the sky. Sitting side by side on the blanket, their hands inched closer and closer until their fingers laced together. Long after the firework was over, Yuuri walked home through the woods, his heart tingling with too many feels, his lips with the memory of another chaste kiss.

~~~~~~~

On a sunny autumn day in the first year Yuuri announced proudly that he had hatched six chickens now and the last one of them was grown up. Eight adult animals on his farm meant he was able to buy an alpaca.

“I will not have much time to stay and talk for a couple of days. But I will stop by and drop off your daily gift,” Yuuri said and explained how he was going to take the alpacas to a place called Animal Sanctuary as soon as he had bought them.

“They need a certain amount of hours there until they give great wool. I need great alpaca wool.”

Yuuri’s eyes shone with eager enthusiasm.

“For what?” Victor asked, amused by Yuuri’s excitement.

Yuuri’s grin widened. “It’s a surprise.”

~~~~~~~

“You didn’t come yesterday,” Victor said, a little miffed, one of the early winter days of the first year.

“I’m sorry.” Yuuri was out of breath. Perhaps he had run a little fast towards the mountain top after one day’s absence. But there was always so much to do on the farm at the beginning of a new season, it was almost noon by the time he was able to set out.

“I had to deliver a lamb.” He tried to look apologetic, but it was hard to hide his accomplishment.

“Really?” Victor seemed to think about that. “And… did it go well?”

“Yes!” Yuuri’s smile became huge and happy then. He could see Victor’s mood lifting. “She’s very well and very cute. I named her after my sister. Because her mother is named after mine.”

“You look very happy, Yuuri.” Victor sighed and smiled, too, slain by Yuuri’s good mood.

“No need to be charming.” Yuuri grinned and opened his backpack to take out a small lidded bowl. “I made you egg custard. You said you like that?”

Victor’s jaw dropped. It had been weeks and weeks ago that he’d mentioned it. “You did? But it was a rare recipe and you needed special ingredients.”

“I had to do a lot of cooking and give Clement so many gifts until he would hand over his Master recipes.” Yuuri’s eyes were sparkling. “And don’t get me started on how many fish traps I had to set until I caught some clams! And you can only find shiitake in the spring and summer, so I had to use dried mushrooms, but I think it came out alright. It tastes very close to the one my mother makes.”

Yuuri finally stopped rambling and held out the small clay bowl. Victor moved as close to the edge as he could. They had figured out a way to exchange cooked gifts so they wouldn’t spill in the pond if Yuuri tossed them. Stretching and leaning as close towards each other as they possibly could, never touching, not even the brush of a finger.

“Oh.” Yuuri scratched his head when he saw Victor look at the bowl curiously and remembered he would need to eat it with something. “Spoon.”

He picked up the spoon he had brought along and waited until he had Victor’s attention until he threw it. Both of them laughed when Victor caught the spoon with one hand.

Yuuri watched him for a while, eating the egg custard and making small happy sounds of appreciation.

“I take it you’re not angry anymore?” Yuuri asked at last, hands on his hips.

“I never was!” Victor exclaimed with utter conviction. They both burst out laughing.

~~~~~~~

In the middle of winter of the first year, Yuuri tried a new recipe and brought it to the pond. He hadn’t been able to resist buying the pack of cocoa when he saw it for sale in the General Store. He missed his mother’s cooking in the winter especially, and as there was little farm work to do in winter he set about making the soft chocolates he had loved so much at home and brought some to the pond for Victor.

He had no idea why Victor was blushing quite so hard when the unwrapped the small package Yuuri had tossed in the pond for him, but he seemed to like the chocolates.

And Yuuri was mostly glad he had found something to give that made Victor almost as happy as strawberries in those seasons strawberries didn’t grow.

~~~~~~~

On the last day of the first year, Yuuri took a detour by the pond on his way to the festival plaza. He had brought his first broccoli, ripe just in time before the season was over even though one day late to enter it in the winter crop festival. Yuuri had never grown broccoli before, and he was looking forward to the profits and the new recipes he would be able to try.

“Yuuri!” Victor looked the broccoli over from all sides like he had never seen anything like it before. “Aren’t you supposed to be at the New Year’s Eve festivities?”

“I will go in a moment, I just wanted to…” Yuuri hesitated. “Stop by and wish you a happy new year.”

“Yuuuuuuri!” Victor’s faint blush was glowing in the winter night.

“I can’t believe my first year is already coming to an end,” Yuuri mused. “It went by so fast.”

“Did you find what you were looking for, Yuuri?” Victor asked.

Yuuri held his gaze for a long moment. “Everything and more,” he said at last.

“Go eat your soba noodles,” Victor said softly. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

~~~~~~~

Yuuri’s second year began with an extension of his farm to the east. Suddenly he head so much more to do, four extra terraced stretches of land to plough and sow. He felt brave and spent money on rice paddies, planting his first seedlings with the beginning of spring. Hana began selling new kinds of crop seedlings in her store, and Yuuri bought and sowed whatever he could. There were definitely advantages to being friends with a Harvest God, he thought every morning as he watched the progress of his crops when he watered them. Vicchan was trained to help bring animals out of the barn on sunny days and back inside in the afternoon, and Yuuri took care of them as best as he could. He brushed them every day and gave them treats to increase their productivity. He planned on entering competitions from the second year on.

In the middle of spring of the second year, Yuuri woke up one morning to find a cream puff on his table. Confused, he placed it in his fridge for later and left the house to start the day’s work.

It was Hana who told him about Spring Harmony Day when he came to the General Store to buy seeds. His maker shed was ready yet still painfully void of machines, including the seed maker. Mining for the necessary ores was not Yuuri’s favourite thing to do, and he was beginning to fret that this tools might just not be good enough.

“Did you receive a sweet gift today, Yuuri?” Hana asked as she handed him new cabbage seeds. 

Yuuri’s eyes widened. “Did _you_ sneak into my house and put that cream puff there?”

She began to laugh. “That Dunhill! Lured you here and told you a million stories but forgot to mention Spring Harmony Day. Probably because his wife has been living in another city for so long now.”

“Spring Harmony Day?” Yuuri asked, wide-eyed. Something about this reminded him of a holiday back home that had always had his sister in a huff when she came home from school with chocolate gifts and complained loudly about the stupid boys who had forced them on her. Yuuri had been happy - he had gotten to eat most of the chocolate because Mari didn’t like it.

“Did you give someone chocolate on the 14th day of winter?” Hana asked.

Yuuri shook his head, starting to deny, when a memory came to mind. Of a recipe he had tried out on a boring winter’s day. And a small packet of soft chocolates he had… _oh_.

Thrown in the Harvest God’s pond.

“On Spring Harmony Day you receive something sweet from your sweetheart, but only if you gave them chocolates on Winter Harmony Day.” Hana beamed at him.

“But I don’t have a sweetheart!” Yuuri exclaimed. His face was glowing so much with embarrassment he was pretty sure it had the colour of a beet all the way up to the roots of his hair.

Hana’s laugh was more of a cackle. “I don’t know how you call it in your country, but over here, when you go see someone every day to bring them gifts and spend a lot of time with one person, we call that a sweetheart.”

Yuuri gasped for air. “But he is the Harvest God!”

Hana looked at him in that almost pitiful way old people have when they think those poor youngsters still have a lot to learn. “Who can be courted and wed like a human, did you not know?”

~~~~~~~

Next time he was resting in the grass by the pond, Yuuri tried to ask as casually as he could.

“Did you know that it’s possible to court and marry a Harvest God?”

“Yuuuuuuri!” Victor all but hid his face behind a veil of hair. “Are you proposing to me?”

“No.”

Yuuri flushed crimson. He picked a leaf from the wild mint growing nearby, rubbed it briefly between his fingers before he popped it in his mouth. After chewing for a while, lost in thought, he looked up.

“Would you refuse if I was?” he asked, curiously. And held his breath.

“No.”

Yuuri could have sworn he could see distinctly red cheeks behind that veil of hair.

~~~~~~~

“You need to give me gifts.” Victor’s eyes sparkled with glee. “It’s a marriage requirement.”

Yuuri nodded. His ears were very pink and his smile very wide. His heart was dancing in his chest. Sometimes he still felt the need to pinch himself. Here he was, courting the Harvest God of these lands he had merely wanted to work as a humble farmer. He almost dreaded having to tell his parents in his next letter home for fear of his mother closing the onsen and setting out right away at the prospect of getting a son-in-law.

“I’m not surprised,” Yuuri grinned. “You like gifts. How many?”

Victor smiled meekly. “Five hundred.”

“ _Five hundred???_ ” Yuuri yelled. The wild rabbits who had come out to play again froze before they ran off in fright.

“I didn’t make the rules, Yuuri.” Victor shrugged.

“Are you sure?” Yuuri looked across the pond at him with narrowed eyes. He wouldn’t put it past him.

“Yuuuuuuri!” Treacherous pink tinted Victor’s nose and cheeks. “No Harvest deity has been courted in these lands for the longest time. I guess the rules are a little outdated.”

“You don’t say,” Yuuri mumbled. He took a deep breath of resignation.

“Okay, so... let’s assume I find so many in the first place. If I throw fifty gifts into your pond every day, this gift giving part will take about ten days, right?”

“No.” The silver braid swung back and forth as Victor shook his head. “It only counts once per day, no matter how many you throw in each day.”

“ _What!!_ This will take forever!” Yuuri felt upset.

Victor smiled, but it looked a little sad.

Yuuri did a quick calculation in his head, muttering to himself as he did so. “Four seasons… 31 days each… that’s…” His head snapped up.

“Four years!” he said, almost like an accusation. “It’s going to take four years!”

“Nobody said it was easy to court a Harvest God, Yuuri.”

Yuuri leaned back on his hands where he supported himself on them in the grass. He crossed one of his legs over the other.

“So, in about four years from today… you can step down from that…” He motioned at the middle of the pond, where Victor was comfortably hovering in mid-air. “Pond, and leave here with me like a human, and come live with me?”

Yuuri tried to ignore the frantic beating of his heart when he said the words, and then the even more frantic beating when Victor affirmed his question with a vigorous nod.

“Well... I guess the sooner I start, the better.” Yuuri looked around, yanked out a wild chamomile by the roots and hurled it into the pond.

“YUUUUUURIIII!!!!” Victor tried to avoid the splatters and bits of earth flying off the roots as the camomile landed in the pond with a splash.

Yuuri grinned at him. “One!”

Victor gave a small huff, but he wasn’t quite able to hide a smile behind the silver tresses falling softly around his face.

“Do they have to be things you like?” Yuuri wanted to know.

"I’d prefer them to be things I like.”

“Of course you do.” Yuuri chuckled. “But the other things count?”

“Yes, they count.” Victor nodded gracefully.

“How do you know?”

Victor looked just the slightest bit smug down his nose. “I just _know_.”

Yuuri sighed, but it sounded happy.

~~~~~~~

The next time Yuuri came to the pond, he had just won the spring crop festival for the first time. Only with a turnip, but those were the easiest to improve in quality with only shop-bought fertiliser.

His jaw positively dropped when he saw what Victor was holding in his hands.

“You have books?” he asked, astonished. “You live in a pond! How do they not soak?”

Victor shrugged. “Magic?”

Yuuri chuckled. Of course. “So what is this you’re reading? The Harvest God manual?”

It was meant to be a joke but from the way Victor stilled and flushed crimson, Yuuri knew he was right.

Sitting cross-legged in his usual spot in the grass beside the pond, he started laughing. Somehow he wasn’t surprised Victor had to read up on what being a Harvest God entitled. He did seem a little forgetful.

“The Harvest God appears inside of your house when you start courting someone to give you marriage advice,” Victor read and looked up from the book. “I guess I should have done that?”

“But I want to marry _you_.” Yuuri shook his head, confused.

“Yes, Yuuri, and I’m very excited about that,” Victor beamed.

“We talk about this all the time, I know what to do. It’s a bit of a challenge, but you don’t need to give me advice on that.”

Victor cocked his head and placed one finger against his lips, thinking. “This is actually true.”

He stared down at the book in his hand, then finally announced he would read more closely later, perhaps there was something in the appendix regarding the rare case of the Harvest deities themselves being the marriage candidate.

“Once you have handed over a ring to a marriage candidate and have met all the requirements,” Victor was reading from the book again, “the Harvest God will appear again inside your house…”

“To do _what_?” Yuuri interrupted.

“Let me see…” Victor leafed through the book. “It doesn’t say. Perhaps to give the Harvest God’s blessing on your marriage?”

“You will give your blessing on your own marriage to me?”

Victor shrugged. “If it’s something the Harvest God has to do I suppose I must.”

Yuuri laughed until he had tears streaming down his face and Victor asked, greatly concerned, if something was the matter. “No, no, all good.” Yuuri wiped a tear from the corner of his eye with his fingers. “It’s perfect. I can’t wait. It seems like just the thing _you_ would do, bless your own marriage.” He started snickering again.

Victor crinkled his nose a little with disdain, but Yuuri saw the twitching in the corners of his mouth.

“You will need a double bed to get married.” Victor sounded a little shy when he read out this particularly requirement. They both blushed profusely, and Victor quickly turned to the next page.

“And you need to give me a golden ring,” he said, eyes on the book.

“Right,” Yuuri nodded. “Where do I get one?”

“You have to forge it yourself.” Victor looked up. “You can get gold in the mine.”

“Not with _my_ hammer,” Yuuri sighed, and it sounded sad.

“Yuuri!” Victor gasped. “Did you not upgrade your tools???”

Yuuri jumped up from the grass. “I can _do that???_ ”

~~~~~~~

“Yuuuuuuri! Your hair!” Victor gasped when he saw Yuuri sitting in the grass one day in early summer.

“Oh!” Yuuri reached up into the trimmed mop of black hair on his head. “A hairdresser just moved into the village and opened a salon. I’m so glad. My hair was in desperate need of cutting.”

Victor was pouting. “I thought your long hair was cute.”

“I thought it was a nuisance.” Yuuri grinned. He really was relieved.

As if in contradiction, Victor did a graceful tilt of his head that sent the long braid swinging for good measure.

Lying back in the grass, Yuuri repressed a sigh and tried not to think about how, as much as he disliked having long hair himself, he wanted to unbraid Victor’s hair and see it flowing freely. And run his hands through it.

~~~~~~~

Summer was a bit of a lazy season for farming, Yuuri had come to know by his second year. All the crops apart from onions took a long time to grow, so he watered them in the morning and attended to the animals before he set out for the forest where it was cooler as soon as the sun rose high and it became too hot in the valley. He always brought strawberries for Victor until their season was over, and then he brought him other treats.

“Yuuri, did you know,” Victor said one day with shining eyes. “All the gifts you already gave me before you started courting me already count toward the five hundred?”

“Oh.” Yuuri wrestled down the urge to do a silly little dance of relief and excitement. Even the smallest gain of time made his heart do those silly little somersaults of happiness and his smile seem endless.

~~~~~~~

“I have seen the hairdresser,” Victor remarked pointedly one day as summer neared its peak.

Yuuri was lying on his stomach on the grass, legs dangling in the air behind him while he fed Vicchan small treats he had pulled from the pocket of his overalls. He made a noncommittal sound, then stifled a yawn. Working a farm in the summer was a strain. He had to water crops twice a day so they wouldn’t wither in the heat. On the bright side, he was able to grow watermelons now, and they made for wonderful cooling treats on hot summer days.

“He likes to walk in the woods on days the salon is closed,” he told Victor calmly. He didn’t see how it mattered what Allen liked to do in his spare time.

Yuuri giggled when Vicchan licked his face. He rolled over onto his back, holding up the small dog above him by outstretched arms until Vicchan wriggled around too much and Yuuri put him down in the grass.

“He’s very handsome!”

Yuuri frowned at the tone in Victor’s voice and turned over onto his stomach again. “Are you _jealous_?”

“Of course not!” Victor threw his braid back over his shoulder like a statement and huffed for good measure. “Have you upgraded your tools yet, Yuuri?”

It amused Yuuri how eager Victor was to change the subject.

“Not yet,” he replied. “I’ve been asking everyone, but Rebecca doesn’t sell blueprints for tool upgrades.”

“You need to befriend the smith,” Victor told him. “She will give you the blueprints then.”

Yuuri looked at him with his head tilted. “So I should not get my hair cut but I can befriend the smith?”

“The smith is a girl and doesn’t touch you,” Victor replied. It sounded a little complacent.

~~~~~~~

Much to Yuuri’s surprise Iroha, the smith, turned out to be a girl from his own country. She was a little sullen and not exactly interested in making friends. Perhaps this was why Yuuri had never really noticed her. Not that he didn’t understand the wish to keep to herself. He had been the very same when he moved into this deserted village. Making friends with people had been the last thing on his mind.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” she asked, a little stiffly like someone who wasn’t well versed in having company.

Yuuri spotted the collected brands of green tea on her narrow kitchen shelf, greeting him like friends from home.

“I would like that very much,” he heard himself answer, much to his own surprise.

~~~~~~~

“I’ve been thinking about what to make for the picnic,” Yuuri remarked casually one hot summer’s day of the second year as he lay in the shade of the massive copper beech and wiped his brow with his bandana.

Victor tutted and remarked not for the first time how unbecoming he felt this bandana was. He was hovering near the edge of the pond to be closer to Yuuri, and his expression became wistful all of a sudden. 

“Yuuri, I was thinking…”

His tone had Yuuri frown. Suddenly there was this weird tiny knot of anxiety twisting his insides.

“This year I would like to have my one human day in the winter.” Victor sounded almost bashful.

“In the winter?” Yuuri frowned. “That is… forever away.”

“I know.” Victor looked distressed, too. “But it will be truly magical.”

Yuuri hummed low in his throat, thinking for a while. “What day of winter?” he asked at last.

“The 25th.” Victor bit his lip as he looked at Yuuri from under his lashes.

“So late in the season too!” Yuuri didn’t even try to hide his disappointment.

“I’m sorry, Yuuri.” Victor looked equally disappointed. “I could explain to you why, but I don’t want to ruin the surprise.”

Yuuri heaved a deep sigh. “Fine.” He nodded, though it wasn’t clear whether it was for Victor’s or his own’s peace of mind.

~~~~~~~

“So what are you making for your picnic this year?” Iroha asked Yuuri the next morning over what had become their ritual cup of tea at her kitchen table.

“Nothing. Victor wants to have his human day in winter this year.” There was no need to feign indifference, he felt his face drop with disappointment when he even thought about the fact.

Iroha poured over her tea and blew on the still lightly steaming liquid, watching Yuuri over the brim of her cup.

“What day of winter?” she finally asked and drank a sip of tea.

“The 25th.” Yuuri was drawing invisible patterns into the table top with one finger, chin resting in his other hand.

“Oh! Now _that_ makes perfect sense!” Iroha set her mug down on the table. She was grinning.

“What?” Yuuri sat up straighter in the wooden chair.

“The 25th of winter is the Starry Night Festival.” Iroha smirked.

Yuuri crinkled his brow. “He’d rather go stargazing on the mountain top in the freezing cold than enjoy my home-cooked food at a summer picnic?”

“Don’t be dense.” Iroha laughed. She actually _laughed_ at him. “The Starry Night Festival is for lovers.”

She rose and took her mug over to the sink to rinse it. She didn’t turn around when she next spoke.

“It is also the Harvest God’s birthday.”

~~~~~~~

In the middle of winter, Yuuri took a small chocolate cake to the pond.

“Wow!” Victor’s eyes lit up with excitement. “Did you make this for me, Yuuri?”

Yuuri smiled, but he knew he was blushing. “I don’t know how you did it, but you’re the Harvest God so I guess you figured something out… you left that cream puff on my table on Spring Harmony Day, didn’t you?”

Victor had the grace to blush.

“It’s Winter Harmony Day,” Yuuri grinned. “I’m returning the favour.”

He smiled brightly under his woollen hat and wished Victor a nice day before he went on his way.

~~~~~~~

On the 25th day of winter, Yuuri made his way slowly up the mountain. He was carrying not one but two cakes, hoping to get them both to Victor undamaged, his hands stiff and aching in the biting cold.

Victor was waiting for him on the mountain top. His smile made Yuuri warm up instantly.

“Happy birthday.” Yuuri handed him a cake with each hand.

“Yuuri!” Victor started to laugh. “ _I_ meant to surprise _you_.”

Yuuri shrugged a little sheepishly. “I didn’t know it was your birthday. So last year I missed out on this festival.”

For a long moment, Victor didn’t know what to say.

On his first Starry Night Festival, Yuuri ate cake under the night sky and felt the warmth come back into his hands when Victor touched them and caressed feeling back into his ice-cold fingers. The stars felt within reach from where they stood at the top of the mountain, but Yuuri wouldn’t have swapped them for the happiness he already had in his hands.

~~~~~~~

Yuuri’s third year brought another extension of his farm, this one to the west. He built another stable for more animals, planted fruit trees, and started beekeeping by setting up a row of bee huts. He planted rice again after his first successful year of working paddies. His animals were in good shape and had all chances to win first prizes in competitions. Foraging, too, was so much more fun by now since he had started to befriend the harvest sprites and they rewarded him by removing stumps that blocked inaccessible areas in the forest and placed jump mushrooms that allowed him to reach higher places where to find more valuable items. The sprites were actually quite fun company, apart from Yurio, who was just so bad-tempered.

Yuuri wrote enthusiastic letters home and told his family about the new route to his home country that the travel agency was planning to establish.

~~~~~~~

On Spring Harmony Day of his third year, Yuuri woke up to find a plate of cookies on his table. He ate one right away before he headed out to work, grinning around the sweet biscuit in his mouth.

~~~~~~~

A new friend moved to the village soon after. It amused Yuuri greatly that her name was Yuri too. She set up her tailor shop on the edge of the village and soon Yuuri found himself bringing her the few materials he was able to make in the cloth maker in his maker shed. He turned wool, flax and cotton into yarn and then into cloth, picked patterns from Yuri’s catalogues to commission clothes.

His sheep and alpacas became exceedingly spoilt since there was a tailor in town, but Yuuri enjoyed working his hardest improving the quality and quantity of their products.

The first time Victor complimented him on a new outfit, Yuuri felt that the time and effort was well worth it though.

He didn’t tell anyone but Yuri and Iroha that he was hoping to have a kimono made for his wedding day.

~~~~~~~

“Do you age at all?” Yuuri asked, hugging his knees to his chest. It was a lazy day at the end of spring in the third year. He had woken up from a very unsettling dream this morning, crying, and hurried his work along so that he could see Victor as soon as possible.

“Not in his form. I will when I’m human.” And he seemed almost excited about it.

Yuuri could have instantly named at least ten women in his hometown who would faint on hearing that someone was actually looking forward to aging.

“I had a terrible dream,” Yuuri admitted and felt a shudder run down his back at the memory. “That you didn’t age. But I did.” He didn’t elaborate further, it was simply too distressing and sad.

“Oh Yuuri!” Victor looked upset. “Is this why you have a gloomy little shadow around you today?”

“I have _what_?” Yuuri’s eyes widened.

Victor pondered over the answer, thinking about how best to reply. “I can see your moods,” he said at last. “Usually you have this… light around you. It gets brighter when you smile. Or come closer up the mountain path. But today there was darkness. Like you brought your own little cloud.”

“Hm…” Yuuri made the sound low in his throat. “I’ve been feeling moody ever since I got up.”

“It was just a bad dream, Yuuri.” Victor smiled. “I can assure you, I’m going to age once I’m freed from this pond. You will probably have that gloomy little shadow around you again once I start losing my hair and all my charm with old age.”

“No,” Yuuri told him. “I refuse to have any gloomy shadow around me once you are free from this pond.”

~~~~~~~

“I see you cut your hair. _Again_.”

“Yes.” Yuuri sleeked back the strands of hair he’d had trimmed and styled into what he hoped was a more mature look. “Do you like it?”

“I liked it better before,” Victor said crisply.

“Victor.” Yuuri sighed, trying to repress a snicker. “Are you still jealous of the hairdresser?”

“I hear people talk in the forest, you know.” Victor huffed. “I hear a lot of rumours.”

“You cannot be serious.” Yuuri rolled his eyes. “There’s no reason for you to be jealous at all.”

But the mood was sour that day, and Yuuri didn’t stay as long as he would normally have.

It was just his luck, Yuuri thought, that the double bed was ready and delivered that same day. As he lay down to sleep that night, Yuuri turned his back on the empty space beside him in the bed and tried not to feel grumpy. Or lonely.

~~~~~~~

Victor refused to show up for the next couple of days.

Yuuri came by the pond every day, grumpily muttering under his breath how utterly ridiculous Victor was being as he still dutifully threw in his one gift of the day. Never failing to point out how Victor did not deserve it in the slightest for his childish behaviour but that he wanted it to count towards his 500 gifts, and that he absolutely refused to have this take longer than absolutely necessary.

Since Victor chose to sulk, Yuuri used those days to travel as much as he possibly could. The day he found the tenth coconut he had a spontaneous celebratory swim in the ocean because he knew for a fact that he was fed up with travelling to Southern Island and would not come back any time soon.

~~~~~~~

Yuuri was sitting in the recently opened tea house with Yuri and Iroha in the plaza one Friday afternoon in autumn of the third year. Victor had decided to show up and talk to him again that day, so Yuuri felt celebrations were in order.

“Your new haircut is very nice,” Olivia complimented tailor Yuri as she placed their order of apricot cake and pumpkin pudding in front of them.

“Thank you.” Yuri blushed and lowered her eyes. She was a shy girl, happiest behind her sewing machine and really talkative only when it came to fabrics and latest fashion trends. It was one of the reasons Yuuri and Iroha liked her so much. They could relate to the wish to immerse oneself in the things one loved to do best and talk only to a few selected people.

“Oh, before I forget…” Yuuri reached into his pocket and handed Iroha a moon stone he had just this morning come across in the mine. “I really need that next blueprint.”

“Eager for the gold, huh?” Iroha laughed and pushed his hand holding the stone back towards him. “Keep that and build your greenhouse, Yuuri. You should have done so the moment you got that last coconut. After all the effort you made to get that great alpaca wool, I cannot believe you still haven’t built it.”

“But I really need to upgrade my hammer,” he protested and held the moon stone out to her again.

Iroha pushed his hand back once more. “Build a greenhouse, and you’ll have strawberries for your Victor all year round.”

Yuuri considered this for a moment, then pocketed the moon stone with a small happy grin.

Yuri sighed around her spoon of pudding. “I wish I was brave enough to talk to Allen so freely.”

“If you didn’t blush and avert your eyes every time he’s near, you would see that he’s crazy about you!” Iroha told her unceremoniously.

“I do not blush and avert my eyes!” Yuri protested.

“Yes, you do.” Yuuri smirked.

“So stop being prissy, just ask him to Starry Night Festival and then get married and make lots of bespectacled, red-haired babies!” Iroha leaned over the table until her nose was almost touching Yuri’s.

Flushed, Yuri pushed her glasses back up her nose and leaned back as far as her seat allowed.

“Hang on a minute!” Yuuri slammed his spoon down so hard on the table that it made the girls jump.

“Do you think that this is why Victor is so prickly?” he asked, wide-eyed behind his glasses.

“If he overheard people talking in the forest, about Yuri and Allen - and he thinks they mean _me_?”

“I wouldn’t put it past him,” Iroha said at last. “The Harvest deities are well known for their dramatics.”

That same evening Yuuri started on his greenhouse.

~~~~~~~

The next day Yuuri got up extra early and made egg custard before he started his day’s work. He set off for the pond as soon as he was through with his tasks.

He threw a red rose in the pond to summon Victor.

For a long moment they just looked at each other across the pond.

Victor cocked his head.

Yuuri raised one eyebrow.

Victor brought up the red rose to his face and smelled it.

Yuuri waited.

Victor looked at him over the rose still in front of his face.

Yuuri held out the small clay pot of egg custard.

Victor lowered the rose from his face.

Yuuri raised his other eyebrow.

Victor smiled.

Yuuri smiled back.

That day he went home with the feeling that the world was at rights again.

~~~~~~~

The moment the greenhouse was finished, Yuuri set to work with strawberry seeds and fertiliser.

~~~~~~~

Just in time for his third winter, Yuuri had the fireplace built. He bought a table and a sofa which he set up on the carpet just before it, but when he sat down to read like he had dreamed of all those years ago, he couldn’t help being acutely aware of the unoccupied space on the sofa beside him. 

~~~~~~~

Victor’s happy face when Yuuri presented him with fresh strawberries in the middle of winter was priceless.

~~~~~~~

“So…” Yuuri side-eyed Victor, feeling a little nervous. It was the Starry Night Festival of the third year, and they were standing at the top of the mountain, looking at the night sky. “Does your day of being human end with the day itself and you turn into a pumpkin at the stroke of midnight?”

“Why would I turn into a pumpkin?” Victor frowned.

“Never mind.” Yuuri shook his head, remembering too late that the reference would mean nothing to Victor. “Does my time with you end at midnight?”

“No.” Victor smiled. “It’s a full twenty-four hours from the moment I step out from the pond.”

They looked at each other in silence for a long moment.

“And… are you confined to the vicinity of the pond or can you leave the area and go somewhere else?”

Yuuri swallowed hard, his eyes on Victor’s.

Victor held his gaze. “I can leave the area and go somewhere else.”

“Even as far as my house?” Yuuri almost whispered.

Victor moved in close enough for their chilled noses to touch. “Even as far as your house,” he said and slipped one of his hands into Yuuri’s.

“Yuuri! Amazing!” Victor clapped his hands like an excited child when Yuuri placed a plate before him. “This is the prettiest omelette I’ve ever seen!”

Yuuri couldn’t help a proud little smile at Victor’s praise of his cooking. They ate together, sitting opposite each other at Yuuri’s table, and Yuuri couldn’t help wishing for time to pass faster and the one remaining year to go by in the blink of an eye.

He served strawberry ice-cream for dessert and they ate it on the couch in front of the fireplace, staring into the flames in comfortable silence. Yuuri grabbed a book from the shelf and read to Victor, little stories and fairytales from his home country.

When Victor started to doze off on his shoulder, Yuuri shook him gently awake.

“Victor…”

Blue eyes blinked at him sleepily a couple of times.

“It’s time I walked you back.”

Victor nodded, his sigh echoing loudly within the empty areas of Yuuri’s heart.

On the way out, Yuuri noted very well that Victor threw a quick glance at the double bed in passing. Luckily he didn’t comment on it. Both their faces were glowing so red they might have served them as lamps on the way back through the night.

As they walked back through the silent woods, the snow crunched under their feet and was glistening on the grounds and weighing down the trees. Hands entwined between their bodies, they shared their quiet hopes and dreams of a time when Victor wouldn’t need to be walked back but have his home with Yuuri.

~~~~~~~

On Spring Harmony Day of the fourth year, Yuuri sat grinning on his couch, feet on the table, as he spooned the soy milk pudding he had found on his table into his mouth for breakfast.

~~~~~~~

Yuuri lowered the axe to the ground and wiped his face with his bandana. Looking around his farm for a moment, he took in the fields he had placed all over, matching each crop with the soil it needed to produce the best quality. His maker shed was fully equipped with all the machines now, and when he went to the General Store these days it was for small things like salt and curry powder, now that he was able to make improved seeds in his shed and even grew his own rice. Two more dogs were trained to herd animals now, both of them bigger than Vicchan, and it was hilarious how the both of them were bossed around by the much smaller dog. Yuuri had had to mourn his first chickens dying of old age and became quite the successful alpaca farmer. He was very good with all his animals, but the alpacas were his pride and joy.

He was living the live he had always dreamed about. The one thing still missing was a companion.

Yuuri gritted his teeth, picked up the axe and went on clearing his lands from unwanted tree stumps for a new flowerbed.

~~~~~~~

“What will I do all day?” Victor asked on a quiet day in summer of the fourth year. “Once I become human and live with you on your farm?”

“I don’t know.” Yuuri was chewing on a mint leaf again as had become his habit. “Can you cook?”

“I can _try_.” Victor tilted his head in thought.

Yuuri laughed. “That will do for the beginning.”

A thought struck him after a while. “Will you still be able to do magic?”

Victor thought about this for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he admitted at last. “I would have to check the book again, I can’t remember if I’ve read about this before. I can still do magic when I become human for one day each year, so…”

Yuuri hummed.

“Will you mind, Yuuri?” Victor asked after another moment of comfortable silence. “If I _can’t_ do magic?”

Yuuri shook his head. “Not at all. I will be very happy if you’re just Victor.”

He could have sworn there was a rainbow as the sunlight hit the spray of the waterfall and the whole area around them shimmered with something akin to happiness, but then it was probably only Victor showing off.

~~~~~~~

The day Yuuri mined his first gold, he nearly cried with relief. He dropped everything and ran through the woods and across the plaza until he slid open the door to Iroha’s house, bending over with his hands resting on his knees for a moment as he tried to catch his breath.

Iroha lifted her protective visor and peered at him.

Still out of breath, Yuuri reached into his pocket and wordlessly showed her the lump of gold.

A triumphant grin passed between them.

~~~~~~~

On the 25th of winter in the fourth year, Yuuri reigned in his steps when he walked up to Victor’s pond.

Even if his calculations were off by a couple of days, he knew that this was the last time he walked up to Victor’s pond for the Starry Night Festival. The next one, and all the ones to come, they would start out walking together from Yuuri’s, no. From _their_ house.

“I’ve got something for you,” Yuuri said quietly as they stood under the night sky gazing at the stars.

“A birthday present?” Victor asked, his light blue eyes dancing with joy.

“Not quite…” Yuuri blushed, the sudden heat in his cheeks making his cold face tingle. “You could decide it is one, though.”

He slipped his hand out of Victor’s very gently and turned to face him, turning Victor by his shoulders until they stood face to face.

“I know there are some gifts left to give until all the requirements are met but… this is probably the best moment to give you this, so…”

Yuuri reached into the pocket of his coat.

Victor’s eyes widened when he saw the golden ring in Yuuri’s hand, but he watched, wide-eyed, when Yuuri reached for his hand and slipped the ring on his finger.

“Did you keep count of the gifts?” Yuuri asked, when they couldn’t stop laughing with joy and anticipation.

“No.” Victor shook his head and held Yuuri’s hands tight in his. “But it won’t be long now.”

They stood in silence for a while, until Victor’s face lit up and he announced he had a surprise for Yuuri, too. He led Yuuri by the hand, down the small path from the mountain top back to his pond. Only then did he let go of Yuuri’s hand. Yuuri gaped, standing beside him by the edge of the pond, watching how Victor moved his hands over the water in slow, graceful movements. He heard the crackle, saw the veins of ice crawling all over and within the water until dark night water became all solid and the whole pond was frozen.

Next thing he knew, Victor grabbed his hand once more. Yuuri didn’t feel the slightest bit of fear when they stepped on the ice together. He trusted Victor. Smiling, Victor moved his hands again, fingers pointing at their feet, and Yuuri’s eyes became the size of saucers when shining blades appeared under their shoes and he felt himself strangely elevated from the extra height and held on tighter to Victor’s hand for support when the ground under his feet felt suddenly slippery and unsteady.

“I’ve been wanting to do this in case I can’t do magic any longer soon,” Victor explained, looking smug. “Skate with me, Yuuri?”

“You never fail to surprise me.” Yuuri shook his head, smiling with his whole face, and heart, his whole being.

They skated under the stars until they began to fade, their laughter echoing through the snow-covered forest.

~~~~~~~

It was a potato, of all things, that turned out to be the 500th gift. They had started to make a game of it, Yuuri tossing the first thing that came under his nose into the pond, knowing it could be any day now that all the requirements were fulfilled. He even threw several branches of wood, taking care not to hit Victor’s head again. As soon as the 500th gift hit the pond, a flash of white erupted from the pond like the day Yuuri first summoned Victor. Yuuri staggered backwards until his back nearly hit the tree nearby as he stared wide-eyed and with hammering heart at the pond over which something like sparkling fog slowly began to dissolve. Revealing, not over the pond but in the grass right next to it, the familiar form of a man.

“Yuuri!” Victor said and started walking towards him, no longer a god but still all magic.

“Victor!” Yuuri crossed the small distance between them and felt himself lifted off the ground and spun around when he flung himself into his arms.

“So. What are we going to do first?” Victor asked, as excited as a child at his birthday party.

“I made plans for today,” Yuuri said. “But you won’t like them.”

“I will, Yuuri!” Victor announced. “Any plan you made for us will make me happy!”

“Not this one.” Yuuri grinned. “But first…”

He reached around Victor for the thick, long braid. “Can we undo this?”

For a short while that day when they made their way hand in hand down the mountain and through the forest, Victor’s hair was allowed to fall free, cascading silver all around his body as if he was taking the waterfall with him when the Harvest God left his pond and turned human.

It was not until they stood outside the salon that Victor stopped smiling.

“Yuuuuuuri!” He looked at him, scandalised. “You cannot be serious.”

“You need a haircut,” Yuuri insisted.

“Not here!”

“There is no other hairdresser!”

Victor huffed. “Fine. But _you_ will wait outside!”

“Fine.” Yuuri laughed and opened the door to shoo him inside.

He nearly fell off the fence on which he sat waiting when Victor re-emerged from the salon some time later. It was a shock, but not an unpleasant one. Yuuri should have known he could trust Allen. The short hair with bangs covering Victor’s left eye looked breathtaking.

Yuuri had to clear his throat and stop himself from staring.

“Yuuri!” Victor beamed at him as he turned his head left and right to show off his haircut. “What do you think?”

“I think it looks amazing,” Yuuri said, flustered. “I hope you were nice to Allen though.”

Victor huffed. “He knows what he’s doing as a hairdresser, I’ll give him that.”

Yuuri snorted with quiet laughter. He held out his hand to Victor and led him to their next destination.

“This is my friend,” Yuuri said to Victor once they stepped into the tailor’s. “Yuri.”

He saw Victor frown and hastened to add, “ _Her_ name is Yuri, too.”

“Oh. Hello!” Victor smiled at the young woman behind the counter.

“She is engaged to be married,” Yuuri went on.

“How wonderful,” Victor said with a polite smile.

“To the _hairdresser_.” Yuuri gave him a pointed look.

For a moment there was silence. Yuuri could see the wheels turning in Victor’s head. Across the counter, Yuri was smiling at him, trying hard not to laugh.

“Yuuri!” Victor exclaimed when he found his voice again. “Why did you let me believe people were talking about _you_?”

Yuuri grinned, a little mischievously. “Because you doubted me, and you shouldn’t have done that.”

Victor blushed, but at least he stayed quiet.

An hour later they stepped out of the tailor’s into the spring day, Victor clad in an elegant dark grey suit Yuri had had ready to sell while he had commissioned about twenty more outfits from her catalogue. Victor had also ordered about twenty more bandanas for Yuuri, claiming that if he needed to wear one, it should at least be pretty.

They walked down the wooden steps and stood looking at the village before them for a moment.

Victor’s eyes caught on the flower pots sitting on the wooden steps leading up to the tailor’s door, and he pondered for a moment with his fingers poised against his lips. The marguerites and tulips and pink roses looked rather sad, leaves curling in on themselves, the flower heads drooping. Yuuri was watching Victor. A look passed between them, then Victor let his hand hover back and forth over the flower pots. Very slowly, the leaves unfurled and filled with a healthy green colour. The flower stalks seemed to stand up straight, blossoms filling and opening and proudly raising their heads.

“Still works,” Victor commented with a smug grin.

“Great,” Yuuri grinned right back. “I have crop festivals to win.”

Laughter rang back and forth between them.

“Yuuri.” The sunlight caught in Victor’s ring when he raised one hand to touch his hair like he couldn’t believe that this short do was now his.

“Victor.” Yuuri smiled as bright as the spring sun when their hands slipped into each other’s.

“Let’s go home. We have a new life to begin.”


End file.
